“Don’t open this unit with your face close to the door or it will melt the skin right off. Just like a blast furnace,” the guy said, with unsettling enthusiasm and something like a disturbing twinkle in his eye.
A moment later, he added, “And a couple who had one of those over there woke up in the middle of the night and heard this big CRASH! When they went into their den, there was glass all over the room because the fireplace doors got so hot they blew out. If they had been in there …”
It didn’t take me long to figure out that this salesman in an Upstate fireplace store was definitely in the wrong line of work.
I felt like I was following Igor on a tour of the dungeon. This misemployed, humor-challenged soul had hideous tales of disaster and misfortune for nearly every fireplace and woodstove on display.
“If you’re burning this one too hot and you touch it, it’ll give you third degree burns,” he chuckled. (WHO chuckles at that?)
He made those woodstoves about as appealing as used nuclear reactors from Chernobyl.
As my husband and I listened to his woeful stories, my brain was forced to wander off to greener pastures. He talked while I nodded like a bobblehead doll and tried to figure out how on earth he got his job. All I could figure was that maybe a family member hired him when he got laid off from his position as a crime scene investigator.
He was certainly knowledgeable about everything that could go wrong with everything. He definitely had a real knack for looking menacing and intense. And if causing others to feel awkward is a gift, this guy was truly gifted.
But sales? Really?
No way. Definitely not his thing.
This fellow wore a wedding ring and mentioned his children, so I imagined what life at his house might be like.
I could picture him peering over his morning paper and grumbling, “Watch out for those Cheeri-Os, kids. I heard about a boy who started laughing real hard while he was eating Cheeri-Os and some of ’em went up and got wedged in his nasal cavity. Had to go to the emergency room. Can’t smell or taste anything now.”
Yikes.
I’m sorry to say that some followers of Jesus Christ seem to take a page out of this guy’s sales manual and manage to make Christianity sound about as appealing as one of his woodstove units.
“Come, follow Jesus and be as cranky and miserable as we are.”
“I can’t wait to tell you about all the stuff Christians can’t do.”
Sure, being a Christian in our culture can sometimes feel like trying to clamber up Niagra Falls.
“In this world you will have tribulation,” Jesus said (John 16:33). Sounds like a sure thing to me.
But Jesus went on in that same verse to add, “…take courage; I have overcome the world.”
And because He did, those of us who claim to follow Him should exhibit supernatural characteristics that transcend difficult circumstances and cause us to be the most winsome, joyful, encouraging, honest, kind, generous and hopeful people around.
Jesus doesn’t need salesmen. He needs disciples who spend so much time with Him, in prayer and in His Word, that we’re becoming more like Him all the time. As we do that, we’ll be lights in this dark world (Philippians 2:15). It’s time to shine. We’re not selling used nuclear reactors from Chernobyl, for Pete’s sake. Or exploding woodstoves.
Jesus wants to live in us and through us. Our part? To get out of His way and let Him.